Then just before him a pale flame flickered. The old man had
kindled a little taper that hardly did more than make shallow
hollows in the darkness through which he moved.
It was easy to follow now, and St. George went breathlessly on
past the rudely-hewn walls and giant pillars of that hidden way.
He might have been lost with ease in any of the lower processes of
the palace which they had that morning visited; but he could not
be deceived about the chambers which he had once seen, and this
subterranean course was new to him. Was it, he wondered, new to
Olivia, and to Jarvo? Else why had it been omitted in that
morning's search? And was this strange guide going on at random,
or did he know--something? A suspicion leaped to St. George's mind
that made his heart beat. The king--might he be down here
after all, and might this weird old man know where? His own
consciousness became chiefly conjecture, and every nerve was alert
in the pursuit; not the less because he realized that if he were
to lose this strange conductor who went on before, either in
secure knowledge or in utter madness, he himself might wander for
the rest of his life in that nether world.
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